EMBRACING CULTURE AND DESIGNING AN INTERGENERATIONAL TRAINING PROGRAM TO SUPPORT LATINE ELDERS

Abstract Although there have been efforts to promote health equity and increase representational diversity in research, there is a gap in our understanding on how to integrate cultural considerations into the intervention design process. Dementia caregiving interventions too frequently lack prioritization and integration of community-directed and culturally appropriate inputs during intervention planning. Consequently, intervention fit among racial and ethnic populations is sometimes culturally incongruent and intervention acceptability in community settings is weakened. We conducted a formative analysis drawing from research team member memos, document review, World Cafes with Latine community residents, and group interviews with Latine organizational staff to understand the intervention development process of an intergenerational dementia training program to support elders within the Latine community. The design process integrated iterative periods of listening through data gathering, informing by applying learned information to the developing program, and affirming through validation. Our analysis demonstrates the need for a broad range of skills and capacity to facilitate effective intervention design (language mastery among key research team members, program design skills, listening, relationship building).

Learned" describes the co-development process employed in the design of an intergenerational respite program for older adults within the Latine community.Finally, we will present findings of a feasibility study of an evidence based intervention that was adapted for African American women with pain and depression.African immigrants are a fast-growing segment of the U.S. Black population but dementia literacy and care needs of this population are not fully understood.A dementia care assessment in the community highlighted dementia education as a high priority need in the African immigrant community in Minnesota.This presentation will describe the collaborative process between the research team and a community project advisory board (PAB) to develop a culturally tailored dementia education program and booklet.Following several meetings and reviews, the PAB approved an interview guide that was used to conduct 10 key informant interviews (with leaders including priest, executive directors etc.) and three community conversations (30 participants).This data was used to identify important cultural dimensions for incorporation into the education program.Themes identified were need for respect, attitudes, beliefs and challenges related to dementia care.Identification and debunking of dementia and dementia care myths were also highlighted.The resulting educational content has been presented at 3 community events/organizations with many more scheduled in spring 2023.The African community in Minnesota is very receptive of the education program with many individuals noting that it truly captures African immigrant cultural norms and values.The collaborative process between the research team and the advisory board could serve as a model for creating culturally tailored dementia education programs in other communities.Additionally, successful implementation of this education program has implications for improving dementia care among African immigrants and reducing health disparities in this population.
caregiving interventions too frequently lack prioritization and integration of community-directed and culturally appropriate inputs during intervention planning.Consequently, intervention fit among racial and ethnic populations is sometimes culturally incongruent and intervention acceptability in community settings is weakened.We conducted a formative analysis drawing from research team member memos, document review, World Cafes with Latine community residents, and group interviews with Latine organizational staff to understand the intervention development process of an intergenerational dementia training program to support elders within the Latine community.The design process integrated iterative periods of listening through data gathering, informing by applying learned information to the developing program, and affirming through validation.Our analysis demonstrates the need for a broad range of skills and capacity to facilitate effective intervention design (language mastery among key research team members, program design skills, listening, relationship building).

FEASIBILITY AND ACCEPTABILITY OF A DEPRESSION AND PAIN INTERVENTION WITH OLDER AFRICAN AMERICAN WOMEN
Janiece Taylor 1 , Catherine Clair 2 , Laura Gitlin 3 , Karen Bandeen-Roche 1 , Melissa deCardi Hladek 4 , Tiffany Riser 5 , Roland Thorpe 1 , and Sarah L. Older African American women experience social determinants of health that put them at risk for experiencing comorbid pain and depressive symptoms.The purpose of our study was to tailor a preexisting evidence-based depression intervention to include pain and test it in older African American women.We conducted a randomized waitlist control study with 21 frail or pre-frail, African American women, 50 years of age and older with pain and depressive symptoms.The average age of the participants was 64.8 (SD: 10.5), average pain intensity was 7.0 (SD: 1.9) out of 10, and average PHQ-9 depressive symptoms score was11.9(SD: 4.0).Effect sizes at 12 weeks post intervention were -1.05 for depressive symptoms indicating a substantial decrease in depressive symptoms.We did not see a significant change in pain intensity but identified changes in pain behavior scores.The women described the intervention as beneficial and provided suggestions for future iterations.

NEW DIRECTIONS IN RESEARCH ON THE DYNAMICS OF PURPOSE IN LIFE AND COGNITIVE AGING Chair: Angelina Sutin
Purpose in life is the feeling that one's life is goal oriented and has direction.There is converging, replicated evidence that having a greater sense of purpose in life is associated with better cognitive aging outcomes, including less cognitive decline across middle and older adulthood and lower risk of incident dementia.Emerging evidence also suggests that cognitive function may likewise support purpose in life.This symposium highlights recent advances on the dynamics between purpose in life and cognition across varying time scales and populations.Kim will describe the association between purpose in life and the maintenance of better cognitive function across six years in older adulthood and moderators of this association.Nelson and Bergeman will describe how cognitive function supported purpose in life through the uncertainty of the Covid-19 pandemic and moderators of this association.Pfund and colleagues will report on the bidirectional associations between purpose and cognition in older adulthood across four longitudinal samples using a coordinated data analytic approach.Finally, Sutin and colleagues will report on an ecological momentary assessment study that found that in moments when participants felt more purposeful, they had faster processing speed.Collectively, these talks emphasize the dynamic and often bidirectional relation between purpose in life and cognitive function.This work will help stimulate research to better understand purpose and cognitive health and how to leverage purpose in life for healthier cognitive aging outcomes.

HAVING A SENSE OF PURPOSE IN LIFE AS A PROTECTIVE FACTOR FOR COGNITIVE DECLINE IN LATER ADULTHOOD Giyeon Kim, Chung-Ang University, Seoul, Republic of Korea
The purpose of this symposium presentation is to discuss the role of having a sense of purpose in life in protecting against cognitive decline in later adulthood.The speaker presents recent findings on purpose in life as a protective factor for cognitive decline from a nationally representative sample of older adults.First, the speaker presents evidence that older adults with a purpose in life showed slower trajectories of cognitive decline during the 6-year period and that purpose in life was a significant moderator of age-and race/ethnicity-cognitive decline associations in later adulthood.Second, the speaker presents evidence that a significant moderating role of purpose in life in the relation of widowhood to total cognition and fluid intelligence, but not in the widowhood-crystallized intelligence relation and that the significant moderating role of purpose in life was found only for those who were female, White, and more educated.Lastly, the speaker discusses implications for research and practice, as well as directions for future research on educational programs to improve purpose in life among older adults from diverse backgrounds.